Driving Lessons
by evildevilgirl02
Summary: May gives Skye a lesson on driving the Bus. Written as part of Femslash February. Ongoing.
1. The First Lesson

"May?"

May's position and expression did not change, but Skye knew she heard her. Skye's hands were clenching and unclenching when she sat down. Skye looked down at her hands as she continued to speak.

"I think you're really great and I-I love you." Skye looked up from her hands to see May unchanged. "Well, um, I guess I'll leave you to your piloting."

Skye had been about to open the door when she heard May speak. "Would you like to learn how to drive the Bus?" May asked. "Of course, it takes years to learn, but maybe just enough to put the Bus on autopilot if/when I'm unable to pilot."

Skye had turned around at these words. "S-sure," Skye said.

Skye returned to her seat next to May and waited. For a long while, May said nothing. Skye felt impatient, but she knew that was just her way. Finally, May broke the silence.

"Good, you have patience," she said. "But maybe not common sense. Buckle your seatbelt."

Skye blushed as she did so.

"Now, look at the way I am holding the yoke. My hands are firm and steady. They do not tremble or twitch. Take note also of their positioning on the yoke as well as relative to each other."

Coulson's voice sounded out over the intercom. "May, I need to come to my office as soon as possible."

May pushed and held down a button to reply. "I'll be right over, sir." She took her finger off the button. After setting the plane on autopilot, she unbuckled her seatbelt and got up. She spoke as she worked. "I hope you realize that these lessons are to be kept a secret for now."

"Of course," Skye replied, understanding completely.

Before leaving the room, May leaned down and gave Skye a swift kiss on her cheek. Skye's cheek grew hot. She sat there for what seemed like a long while after May left, before leaving the cockpit as well.

_Secret? Fine by me._


	2. Intermission

AN: Sorry it's so short! I felt the first scene was necessary, and it just came out short (hence my adding the second part. I will try to make the next chapter longer. ;)

"I thought I'd give you a little debriefing on the mission so you could do some research before I told the rest of the team," Phil Coulson said.

"How much time do I have?"

"Two hours. I need you to read up on Ian Quinn and his operations, and acquaint yourself with the work of Dr. Franklin Hall if you were unfamiliar with it before. We're flying here." Coulson handed May a paper with an address on it.

May nodded in understanding. "Sir, I'd like to teach Skye how to fly the Bus." At Coulson's questioning look, she continued. "It would help to integrate her into SHIELD and allow for an alternate pilot should anything happen to me. It would also grant her skills that would be useful in other scenarios, such as clearheadedness and structure."

"Structure?"

"Flying, unlike hacking, is not creative problem solving. You fly the plane the right way or you crash. Skye would be introduced to the strict format that SHIELD generally follows."

Coulson nodded in understanding. May was stopped in her tracks as she was about to leave. "Anything else?"

In that moment, May knew that Coulson knew. "Don't tell Skye that you know," May said before leaving.

Skye left a few minutes after May, attempting to "stagger" their exits. She headed straight back to her dorm, fortunately not running into anyone on the way, and waited for the blush to leave her cheeks. Skye had never considered the possibility that May _reciprocated_ her feelings. Should she be worried about the age difference between her and May? How old was May?

_There's so much I don't know,_ Skye thought.

Skye looked at her watch. _Oh, crap, I'm late._ Skye put May in the back of her mind as she headed downstairs for her afternoon training session with Ward.

AN2: If you can't tell, the first two chapters are immediately pre-ep3.


	3. The Second Lesson

AN: A huge thank you to androidilenya for beta-ing!

Skye was exhausted by the time she finished her training with Ward. When she got back to her dorm, she found a note by her bed. _1:00 tomorrow_, it read. Skye quickly hid it (in case someone else came to visit), and got into bed. She fell asleep thinking about how May's lips felt on her cheek.

–––––

Skye arrived a few minutes early to find the cockpit empty. She sat down and waited. There was, in her mind, a huge difference between late for training with Ward and being late for..._whatever it was _with May.

May came in and sat down, buckling her seatbelt. She did not look at Skye. "Your seat belt's unbuckled."

Skye buckled her seat belt and opened her mouth to speak, but May cut her off.

"I am going to teach you how to pilot the Bus. Coulson knows."

Skye was a bit surprised by the second revelation, but decided to focus on the first. "I thought learning to fly took years."

"The same goes for becoming a field agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., but I don't see you backing down from that goal."

"Touche, but what about our-"

"Relationship? What about it?" May turned to face Skye.

"What is it? What about the age gap? Are we telling the others? How does Coulson know?"

"Any other questions?"

Skye had several more, but since she found herself unable to articulate them, she kept quiet.

"Our relationship is one of mentor and student who occasionally kiss. If the age gap bothers you, tell me, but I had expected that you'd thought this through before you came to me a few days ago." As she spoke, she put on her helmet and checked the flight conditions. "We are not telling the others. Coulson found out when I went to tell you that you would be getting piloting lessons from me." She turned back to Skye with a neutral expression on her face, waiting for her pupil's reaction.

Skye was silent as she took it all in. _Mentor and student who sometimes kiss? What kind of _bullshit _is that?_ But that was not what she said next. "How often is 'occasionally'?" she asked submissively. She hadn't meant to ask that, but something about May made Skye quiver and her resolve melt.

May raised an eyebrow. "I guess it depends on how well you learn your lessons." Her mouth curled into a smile.

Skye gulped nervously. "Well, then, I guess I should get started." She smiled weakly back.

May turned back to the controls. "Let's begin."


	4. Chapter 4

AN: A huge thank you to androidilenya of for betaing! Several other huge thank yous to everyone who hasn't given up on this fic! I'm soooooo sorry. I'll try to post the next chapter sooner than next month! :)

May waited outside the bedroom with Skye's shirt.

"A suite? You? That's funny but they're never gonna let me go on anything if I don't find my stupid-" Skye opened the door to Agent May, who was holding her "-top."

"Get. Dressed."

Skye looked shocked and upset. _Isn't that big of her, _May thought. _**She's**_ _upset._

Ward seemed distraught. He must have taken Skye's playful flirting seriously.

May's hard expression did not change until that night when she went to shower. Steeling herself, she punched the wall with her left fist. A few miniscule pebbles fell to the floor. She punched the wall with her right fist. A few pebbles of more worrisome size joined the ones on the floor. Unable to do any more damage to the shower without risking the integrity of the infrastructure, May settled for scrubbing herself extra hard that night. In spite of that, she still hurt more inside.

She went to sleep feeling bitter. _This_ was why she didn't let people in.  
-

Skye decided to go to the cockpit the next day because _not_ going would be worse. She didn't know what she was going to say, but she knew she had to say something.

May was already there, piloting the plane. Skye sat down quietly beside her and tried to figure out what to say. Her fingers drummed silently on her thighs.

"May, I-I'm sorry, for what happened. I know that's not enough to make up for it, but I just thought I should say that first. With Miles," Skye looked down at her knees, "I-I don't know what came over me. I really want to find my parents and-and the Rising Tide offered information and Miles…" Skye's voice picked up speed. "I completely understand if you want to break it off, if you don't want to see me any more than you have to. Just say the word, and I'm gone. W-We'll be no more than coworkers."

Skye's heart ached to say that, but she knew she had to. Excuses were pointless. She would do whatever May asked of her to make up for this. She'd take down Centipede _and_ the Rising Tide herself, if that's what it would take to get May to forgive her.

May mulled over what Skye said. Her chest hurt to hear Skye say those words. _We'll be no more than coworkers._ May didn't know if she could go back to that. Well, of course she _could_, but she really didn't want to.

_Steady, May. Say what you have to say._

"How do I know that I can trust you after what you did?"

She had meant to sound neutral, but it came out bitter and untrusting. She hadn't meant to let her mask down, but Skye...did something to her.

Skye's heart leaped. _She's giving me another chance_. Skye held out her wrist, which May could see out of the corner of her eye. On it was a thin band of metal that had not been there before.

"I-Coulson gave me this bracelet. Said it'll monitor my tech stuff so I can't do that again. I don't know that you can trust me. I don't know if _I_ can trust me." Skye curled up into a ball, fiddling with the bracelet.

May stared intently at the sky in front of her.

"If Coulson trusts you, I trust you. Professionally. I trust you not to screw up another mission or betray us again. However, I do not trust you _not _to betray me personally again. I am also terminating your piloting lessons, as you do not seem to be benefiting from them."

May didn't explicitly tell her to leave, but Skye could tell from her tight lips and the way her eyes that focused unswervingly on the sky in front of her that the conversation was over.

May's expression didn't change after Skye left. She'd spent years cultivating concentration and external passivity, so she focused on the sky and tried not to think about Skye.

Skye headed straight to her bunk and locked the door behind her. She knew the walls were thin enough that the others could hear her crying, but she didn't care. She let the sobs come out her throat and the tears roll down her cheeks, almost missing the shy knock at her door.

Skye knew it was Jemma before she opened in the door. Upon seeing Skye's tearstained face, Jemma immediately pulled her into a hug. Skye hugged her back, still crying.

"Do you want to go back to your room?" Jemma asked softly.

Skye nodded into Jemma's shoulder. Still hugging, they hobbled slowly into the room, Jemma removing one arm to close the door behind her before rubbing Skye's back with the arm that closed the door. Skye started sobbing again.

Gently extricating herself from the hug, Jemma appraised Skye's face once more. The tears were still flowing, and her face were starting to become blotchy. Jemma pulled Skye to sit on the bed with her.

"Skye, what happened?"

Skye sniffed. "M-May hasn't forgiven me f-for what I did."

"Just give her some time. I'm sure she'll come around eventually." _Not everyone forgives as easily as I do, _she refrained from saying.

Simmons had forgiven Skye the day before, after Skye had come to her with a long explanation, an apology, and a metal bracelet on her wrist that hadn't been there before.

"How d-do you make up to someone for hurting them?" Skye was on the verge of sobbing again. "I-I r-really hurt May, and I don't know if-" Skye sniffed. "-if things will ever be the same again. I don't know what to _do._"

At a loss, Simmons kept rubbing Skye's back. "Have you never hurt someone before?"

Skye sniffed and shook her head. "Not like _this._"

Simmons frowned. It seemed like there was something Skye wasn't telling her, but she didn't want to push the issue.

"What about making something for her? Aside from hacking, is there anything else you can do?"

"I can paint," said Skye. "M-maybe I could paint a portrait of her. It-it won't hurt to try."

Simmons smiled and continued to rub Skye's back. Skye's tears seemed to be subsiding. In a few minutes, she was going to shove this girl in the shower and go back to her business. There was something going on.


End file.
